In an interview with Bloomberg BusinessWeek he was asked if Apple put its own self-centered, controlling strategy ahead of the customer when it decided to make its own maps as opposed to using Google's maps.

He said, "No." It was actually, the opposite:

The reason we did Maps is we looked at this, and we said, “What does the customer want? What would be great for the customer?” We wanted to provide the customer turn-by-turn directions. We wanted to provide the customer voice integration. We wanted to provide the customer flyover. And so we had a list of things that we thought would be a great customer experience, and we couldn’t do it any other way than to do it ourselves.

Cook doesn't mention this, but there were reports Google wouldn't let Apple have access to turn-by-turn directions. So, Cook says to get something that was better for the customer Apple had to do it itself.

But, he also says, "We’re putting all of our energy into making it right. And we have already had several software updates. We’ve got a huge plan to make it even better. It will get better and better over time."